A cluster lunch was held at the Arizona Inn on April 20, 2015, with a presentation by Matthew Goldstein on the impact of proposed U.S. export controls on fundamental research and scientific publications.
All optics researchers and scientists were encouraged to attend this two hour luncheon, an important meeting for the Arizona Optics Industry Association. The Arizona Inn reserved the Safari Room for the AOIA from 11:30 AM to 2:00 PM. The fee was $35 per person for the hot meal and presentation.
Through April 5, paid up AOIA members and Optical Sciences Center researchers were accepted first, followed by optics related and cluster industry members. From April 6 the event opened to all scientific research fields, with room for up to 100 attendees.
On April 20, 2015, Matthew Goldstein, a Washington D.C. attorney with a law firm focused on international trade law, discussed the implications of proposed changes to the scope of U.S. export controls on fundamental research and scientific publications. The proposed changes, soon to be published in the Federal Register, were expected to adversely impact private and university based research and impose significant restrictions on the right to freely publish scientific information. The changes as proposed would also affect publications that are entirely funded by a private sector company, even if the research was independent of any federal contract.
The focus of the discussion was the scope of the proposed changes, their expected impact on research and development activities, and steps that private industry and academia can take to oppose unwanted agency rule making.